Chevy Volt wins a round against Nissan Leaf

The Chevy Volt isn’t an electric car, exactly. The Nissan Leaf is. Nevertheless, the General Motors car scored a victory today when it beat out the Leaf and the Hyundai Sonata to be voted the North American Car of the Year by automotive journalists at the Detroit auto show.

The Chevy Volt has been voted the 2011 North American Car of the Year. (Getty Images)

The Volt is a plug-in hybrid with a 1.4-liter gasoline engine (comparison). Unlike hybrids like the Toyota Prius, it is capable of all-electric operation, going about 35 miles before internal combustion kicks in to power the battery for another 300 miles or so.

The Leaf has a range of about 100 miles, excellent for an all-electric car but not competitive with gasoline-powered cars.

Both have tiny sales, but the Volt outsold the Leaf by more than 10 to 1 last month, 250-350 for the Volt, less than 20 for the Leaf. At this point, sales are mostly a function of production, as both have long waiting lists and will be ramping up their assembly lines this year.

The Leaf, which won the European Car of the Year award, has many fans and narrowly won the CNet head-to-head competition shown below. But given that U.S. drivers have a higher comfort level with a longer-range vehicle, as well as the larger market share of GM in this country, it seems likely that Volt proves the bigger hit domestically.